1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to weapon safety devices, and more particularly, to a gun safety device which utilizes fingerprint and voice recognition to selectively enable operation and wireless means to disable operation and which is capable of maintaining usage history of the weapon.
2. Description of the Related Art
Over the past several years, the number of children killed by handguns has increased greatly. CNN and the National Center for Health Statistics reported that 5,285 children were killed by guns in 1995 (approximately 14 per day). A Department of Justice study revealed that approximately 13% of students say they know someone who brings guns to schools, while a separate study has revealed that nearly one million U.S. students brought guns to school during a recent academic year.
Often times, the children get the gun in their own homes. It is not uncommon for adults to keep loaded guns in their homes for security purposes. Frequently, such guns fall into the hands of their children or their children's friends, often times resulting in serious injury or death.
Although most guns include a safety latch to prevent accidental firing, they are designed to be easily unlatched so that the gun can be quickly enabled and fired. Thus, the safety latch, by itself, is not an effective deterrent to children.
Moreover, the safety latch, by itself, does not prevent unauthorized usage against the gun owner by an intruder who gains access to the gun. The intruder can merely slide the latch to the unlocked position and use the gun against its owner.
Several devices have been developed to address the need for a more effective safety device for weapons. For instance, U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,467,545, 5,502,915 and 5,603,179 disclose gun safety devices using finger or hand print identification to identify authorized users and enable operation. Similarly, U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,570,528 and 5,459,957 disclose gun safety devices using voice recognition circuitry to identify authorized users and enable operation.
Although useful for their intended purposes, these prior art devices have not proven to be entirely satisfactory. Specifically, these devices all utilize a solenoid, magnet or other electromechanical element coupled to the firing hammer or trigger to enable or disable firing of the gun. Thus, to utilize these prior art devices with existing guns, the guns must be disassembled to install the necessary hardware. Such disassembly, installation of the appropriate hardware and reassembly of the gun may be difficult to accomplish for many people, resulting in the safety device not being utilized.
Furthermore, these prior art devices are specifically designed so that upon fingerprint or voice authorization, the locking mechanism automatically unlocks allowing the gun to be immediately fired. Such an automatic firing ready feature may not always be desirable. For instance, if the device improperly disabled the safety mechanism, either because of a malfunction in the circuitry or because it incorrectly recognized a finger, hand or voice print, the gun will be fully enabled and ready to fire by merely pulling the trigger. Thus, it may be desirable to require further action, i.e., manual sliding of the safety latch, after authorization, before the gun may be fired.
Additionally, the prior art devices utilize only finger/hand print identification means or voice recognition means. However, there may be instances when both finger/hand print identification and voice recognition are desired before the device is enabled.
Also, these prior art devices do not include means for a third party, such as a law enforcement officer, to disable the gun in the event it is being used against such officer or another person.
Accordingly, there is still a need in the art for a gun safety device capable of using both finger/hand print identification and voice recognition means to identify authorized users and enable firing, which may be used with existing guns without disassembling the gun and which does not automatically allow the gun to be fired after authorization by merely pulling the trigger. Any such device should include means for remotely disabling the gun in the event it is being used against a law enforcement officer or another person. The present invention is particularly suited to overcome those problems which remain in the art in a manner not previously known.